The Niece of His Highland Enemy by Alisa Adams
1
Laird Fergus Brodie rode his horse away from the field of battle.
The creature plodded along with its head hung low, its tail flicking listlessly. The horse’s heaving flanks were caked with drying sweat and blood. The noble steed had spent all of its strength and vigor proudly charging into the fray. It had barely any left for a forlorn trudge home in the face of a thoroughly ignominious defeat.
Fergus couldn’t blame the poor beast one bit. In fact, he felt exactly the same.
He was a young laird—“Aye, too young,” some among his clansmen might have said—and with good reason today was covered from head to toe in mud. There had been plenty of other times when he had returned from battles in such a state, but in those instances, he and his fellows had worn the muck and grass and gore proudly in victory.
This time, the dirt that was smeared on the faces of the Brodies was simply the dirt they had been stomped into. They wore it collectively like a brown cloak of shame.
Their banners were tattered and hanging low. Their drums were still. Their boots and broadswords dragged in the soil. Some among them helped to carry their wounded soldiers. Others carried tokens and mementos collected from the bodies of slain friends, to be presented to their wives and children.
Most of them refused to make eye contact with their laird.
The few who did scowled openly and a couple among them spat on the ground contemptuously.
Fergus tried to keep his head high, his eyes forward, and his expression stoic so that his bearing might not betray the shame that gnawed at his heart.
Shame at his own damned hubris.
Clan Brodie had a long and proud history. It was composed of over a hundred proud households inhabiting a wide swath of rich and fertile land on the Isle of Skye. The warriors among them were fine swordsmen and riders and battle-tested to the last man.
By contrast, the Sinclairs, who lived on a meager scrap of craggy territory across a strait to the north, were little more than a ragtag collection of leathery, salt-chafed crabbers and watermen. They hadn’t even dared call themselves a “clan” or hang a tartan banner of their own until roughly a generation ago. Until recently, they had been content to fish the waters in their crude longboats and glare resentfully at the distant shores populated by those who had more than they did.
Then they had started to demand tribute from the Brodies who sailed the strait. When those crews refused, the boats were seized, and the sailors were slaughtered but for a single survivor, left alive to carry the story back to the rest of the clan.
As if that hadn’t been enough of an insult, the Sinclairs had begun to settle on Highland areas that belonged to the Brodies, seizing the farms there from their rightful owners and driving them off or killing them.
Laird Fergus could scarcely believe their arrogance. What manner of fools would provoke such a formidable clan into open war?
Yes, he mused bitterly, wiping a streak of blood from a shallow gash in his forehead. That would have been a wise question to ask myself in earnest before mustering only half of my forces for battle, wouldn’t it? Except that by all accounts, even half of my men should have outnumbered the Sinclairs five to one.
So he had transported his chosen warriors and their horses on ships and barges across the strait, prepared to teach the rapacious Sinclair rabble a short but decisive lesson in respecting their betters—one they would not soon forget. A brief skirmish, an unconditional surrender on the part of the Sinclairs, and there would be no more acts of aggression. The Highland farms would be returned to the Brodies, and all would be right once more.
When their horses reached the village of the Sinclairs, however, it was as though some horrid curtain had been drawn back to reveal the plains of hell itself.
Campbells. Legions of them assembled alongside the Sinclairs. Fully armed, howling and snarling like demons as they swarmed the Brodies, who suddenly found themselves woefully outnumbered.
Oh yes, the fight had been short indeed. And decisive. Fergus had been quite correct in predicting that.
Of the hundred or so brave souls who had gone forth with him from the Brodie castle, fewer than a third of them marched back with him now. It had been a massacre. The worst in the clan’s recorded history.
All because Fergus had been shortsighted and overconfident.
The hooves of their horses began to clop mournfully against the rocky shore, and Fergus saw the shapes of the barges that awaited them. He dreaded reaching them, knowing that the men who had been left behind to tend to them would be devastated at the news of how the fight had ended.
And then there would be more pairs of eyes staring at him reproachfully during the voyage homeward.
Fergus’s father, Gordon, had taken ill and died the previous summer. He had been a respected laird during his reign and was known for being loved by his clan and feared by his enemies. Fergus had loved the old man dearly and had done all he could to learn from him. He had studied the ways of both warfare and diplomacy at Gordon’s side, an avid pupil so that when his time came, he could rule over the Brodies with the same wisdom and strength that his father had been known for.
He’d gone into battle on several occasions when Gordon had been alive. But he had never led the clan into conflict as its laird before today.
Given the tragic outcome, he wondered if these men would ever follow him to war again.
Suddenly, Fergus’s morbid reverie was interrupted by the sight of a figure lying on the beach ahead. He frowned, signaling for the others to halt as he rode ahead to investigate. In truth, he was grateful for the momentary distraction—anything to prevent him from returning to his people with the story of how he had led his kinsmen to their demise.
Still, had he only imagined that he felt a wave of resentment from the men behind him when he’d raised his hand for them to stop? Or was their unwillingness to take orders from him after today truly that palpable?
The thought sent a shudder up his spine, and he tried to shake off the feeling of dread that accompanied it. He crouched down in front of the prostrate form, rolling it onto its back.
It was a woman.
A girl, really. She looked no older than eighteen. Her long brown hair was plastered to her pale face and long neck, and her lips appeared quite blue. Her skin was cold to the touch, and her slender body was limp and lifeless.
Where had she come from? Had she been cast from a wrecked ship, perhaps, and carried to shore by the tide? How long had she been lying there on the sand?
Fergus had no answers to these questions, but he was seized with a deep and sudden longing to discover them. The way her porcelain face was tilted up, so still and peaceful, stirred something within him. Her beauty was so perfect that it haunted him, and grief stabbed his heart. He had seen so many of his kinsmen killed that day, and now this random and senseless tragedy.
She was the loveliest creature he had ever laid eyes on. Why, then, had he not encountered her until she had only recently departed this life—and on this, the darkest day he had ever experienced? How could fate be so cruel?
Then her eyelids fluttered.
The movement was so brief and slight that he was scarcely certain he had even seen it. Part of him was convinced that it was simply wishful thinking playing tricks on his mind, mingled with the shock and horror of the day’s events.
Still, he had to be sure.
Once, as a young boy, he had seen a drowned fisherman returned to life with sharp pressure applied to the chest. He placed his hands on the girl and began to shove down on her body roughly, attempting to force new air and life into her.
Her head bobbed up and down from the impact, and more wet strands of hair fell down over her eyes. But the lids were fluttering—he was sure of it now—and he redoubled his efforts, determined to rouse her.
Fergus felt a hand on his shoulder and heard the voice of his dear friend Edmund at his ear: “In God’s name, man, leave this poor dead girl in peace! Do you want your men to think you’ve gone mad?”
But what difference does it make?Fergus thought, gritting his teeth as he slammed his palms against the woman’s sternum again. My men already think me a fool, so why not a madman as well? I could not save the Brodies who fell in battle today, but so help me, I will save her!
A series of spasms rocked the girl’s body, and her arms flailed outward like a bird stretching its wings before taking flight. Her mouth opened, and she coughed out a torrent of water, inhaling sharply.
Her eyes snapped open, and the green in them was so piercing and vivid that it startled Fergus.
“Well, I’ll be buggered,” Edmund breathed in astonishment.
The woman’s fingers dug into the wet sand, and she pulled herself up into a sitting position, retching more brine. Her chest heaved, and even in his concern for her, Fergus could not help but notice the way her dress clung to her ample bosom.
“Are you all right, my lady?” he asked, peering into those hypnotic emerald eyes.
She coughed once more, and then her eyes rolled up, and she swooned, losing consciousness once more. Fergus moved forward to catch and cradle her before her head hit the sand, and he lifted her. She seemed practically weightless in his arms.
“She shall accompany us,” Fergus declared, carrying her back to his horse. “I hope that our hospitality might assist in her recovery.”
“Aye, she may as well, right enough,” one of the others muttered darkly. “Heaven knows we’ll have room enough to spare on the boats during the trip back.”
